By Sean Jones: In a huge victory that has massive ramifications for the welterweight division, Vergil Ortiz Jr (17-0, 17 KOs) stopped former WBO light welterweight champion Maurice ‘Mighty Mo’ Hooker (27-2-3, 18 KOs)in the seventh round on Saturday night at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas.
Hooker, 31, suffered an injury in the 7th round, causing the fight to be halted. Ortiz dropped Hooker in the sixth round from a left uppercut followed by a right hand.
Hooker had been in trouble from the fifth round after getting hurt from a right-hand body shot from Ortiz. Up until the fifth, the fight was even bascially.
- Cruiserweight Tristan Kalkreuth (8-0, 6 KOs) destroyed Dustin Long (4-2-2, 4 KOs) by a first-round knockout.
- Light welterweight Alex Martin (20-3, 6 KOs) beat Luis Hernandez (21-1, 19 KOs) by a 10 round unanimous decision. The judge’s scores were 100-90, 100-90, and 99-91
- Light welterweight George Rincon (11-0, 7 KOs) beat Luis Solis (25-12-4, 21 KOs) by an eight-round unanimous decision. The scores were 80-71, 80-71, and 79-72.
- Super bantamweight Hector Valdez (14-0, 8 KOs) defeated Alberto Torres (11-4-3, 4 KOs) by an eight-round unanimous decision. The scores were 78-74, 78-74, and 79-73.
Preview:
Vergil needs to make a statement against Hooker tonight to show the boxing world that he’s got the talent to win a world title at 147.
Golden Boy Promotions CEO Oscar De La Hoya believes Vergil Ortiz is the next big star, a 147. Tonight, we’ll get a chance to see if Oscar knows what he’s talking about.
Vergil Ortiz Jr (16-0, 16 KOs) is slowly moving up to a potential title shot against WBO 147-lb champion Terence Crawford, but he needs to beat Hooker (27-1-3, 18 KOs) tonight for him to keep his momentum going.
The five-year professional Ortiz Jr is taking a massive move upwards with his fight against the 5’11” former WBO light welterweight champion Hooker. Until this fight, Ortiz’s best opponents were these fighters:
- Antonio Orozco
- Samuel Vargas
- Mauricio Herrera
- Brad Solomon
Those guys are nowhere near the level of Hooker, and that’s why it’s a mystery how Vergil Ortiz Jr will do tonight. Maybe he’ll win and look great, or we could see a replay of how Ryan Garcia beat Ortiz when the two were in the amateurs.
Ryan was catching Ortiz repeatedly with his powerful left hook, and that impressed the judges enough for him to win a decision. Hooker punches every bit as hard as Ryan Garcia, but he’s more of a two-handed fighter when it comes to his power shots.
Hooker is fighting for just the second time at welterweight and really the first time at the full 147-lb weight.
In Hooker’s previous fight at welterweight, he fought at a 144-pound catchweight against sublevel fighter Uriel Perez last December, and that turned out to be a first-round knockout for Mighty Mo.
Given the poor quality of Hooker’s opponent, he didn’t get anything from that fight in terms of becoming acclimated to the welterweight division. I mean, Hooker might as well have stayed at 140 than to take on a non-top 15 contender.
Unbeaten welterweight contender Vergil Ortiz Jr is taking a big step tonight in what he hopes will lead him to a title shot when he takes on Maurice Hooker at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas live on DAZN.
The start time for the Vergil Ortiz Jr vs. Maurice Hooker card is at 9 pm ET.
Boxing News 24 will be giving live updates and results from tonight’s Ortiz vs. Hooker card below:
Only 22-years-old, Vergil Ortiz Jr is someone that could rise to the top of the welterweight division one day.
Right now, it’s still too early to know if Ortiz is the real deal or just another example of a fighter that couldn’t cut it at the elite level.
Hooker will be a good barometer of whether Ortiz has the talent to make it against the elite-level fighters. Although Hooker isn’t an elite guy by any stretch of the imagination, he’s still a good gatekeeper-level fighter capable of exposing the phony’s.
Hooker is a stablemate of WBO 147llb champion Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford. He can do him a big favor by weeding out Vergil Ortiz Jr so that he can continue concentrating on trying to land fights against Manny Pacquiao and Errol Spence Jr.
The last thing Crawford wants is to be tied down for six months fighting a guy that doesn’t bring much to the table like Ortiz Jr. So if Hooker can kindly get rid of Crawford’s problem tonight with Ortiz; I’m sure he’ll be grateful for taking care of this for him.
“Maurice Hooker, he’s probably the most dangerous fight to date in my career,” Vergil Ortiz Jr said to Chris Mannix at DAZN. “He’s 31 years old; he’s in his prime; he’s just moved up a weight.
“Some people take it as a bad thing, but really, he’s coming up to 147 for the first time — he’s not going to struggle with the weight.”
Vergil recently stopped warhorse Samuel Vargas in the seventh round last summer in July.
For his part, Hooker is fighting for the second time since losing his WBO 140-lb strap in a sixth-round knockout in a unification fight against WBC champion Jose Ramirez in 2019.